Tina Barry
Introduction
Modern psychology relies primarily in experimentation. Since animals and human beings constitute the subjects of experimentation, precautionary measures continue to improve the process of experimentation while producing the less possible amount of damage to animals or human beings. Thus, different models, approaches and theories keep coming up as to how to do experimentation in psychology for furthering research.
Danziger (1985) writes that the experimentation in psychology has evolved as a social institution (Danziger, 1985, p. 133). Similarly, Schultz (1970) recognizes that modern psychological experimentation is the result of a long history of developments that have shaped this science into what is known today.
This paper looks at this evolution of experimentation in psychology and how it -as a social institution- has evolved or developed. It argues that although late 19th century marks the beginning of experimental psychology, the post World War II era brought significant changes into this discipline. Later developments simply included time-to-time evolutionary modifications in that model.
Experimental Psychology
Figuring out the roots and origins of a matter is very important in the case of any historical analysis. However, experimental psychology is widely spread over the history and has disputed roots. Nevertheless, it is only in the late 19th century when foundations of a socially institutionalized modern psychological experimentation occurred. Danziger (1985) argues that the beginning of institutionalization of psychological experimentation began during the last two decades of the 19th century (Danziger, 1985, p. 133). The Leipzig and Paris models are the ones that came on scene initially. According to Strien (2005), both the Leipzig and the Paris models have their roots in the physiological and medical research performed during the 19th century. Instead of passively observing and reporting these observations, they started to alter the function of different organs, thus invasively probing in a methodological manner (Strien, 2005). At the time, replication allowed refining or confirming previous studies while eliminating remaining doubts. However, the main distinction between these two models relies on their aims and objectives. The Leipzig model intended to study and “display universal processes that characterized all normal minds”. In contrast, the Paris model sought to “display the effects of an abnormal condition” (Danziger, 1990, p. 54). Wilhelm Wundt was the man who wrote the first book on experimental psychology in 1874, and opened the first laboratory in Leipzig, Germany in 1879. Similarly, William James and G. Stanley Hall are among other pioneers of this great institution (Danziger, 1985).
Differences remained in the beginning, but the consensus building continued. At the beginning of the 20th century, much of the institutionalization was already done, and rest took place within the first two decades of the 20th century (Danziger, 1985, p. 133). Thus, despite a scattered history, the genuine and modern institutionalization of experimental psychology as a social institution began in the late 19th century.
As mentioned before, the two initial models of Leipzig and Paris differed greatly, especially on nomenclature, regarding how experiments were organized and socially understood. Researchers initially used terms like subjects, observers, reactors, etc., in journals for the species being experimented. Danziger (1985) notes that terminological differences seemed unending, and various institutions and journals were committed on using one type of terminology over the other (Danziger, 1985, p. 134). He notes that by the 1890s, the most frequent terms in psychology were ‘subject’, ‘observer’, and ‘reagent’, in decreasing order (Danziger, 1985, p. 134). The term ‘reagent’ most likely comes from the German phrase Der Reagent, which Wundt used to refer to the person reacting in an experiment. However, this term soon became unused and replaced by the term ‘subject’, indicating the administrative turn of psychology (Dashiel, 1930; Dehue, 2000).
One of the reasons for these differences was the social setup in which different scientists were working, as well as the intended objectives and purposes in mind for the experimental psychology. Cultural or social psychology started to set apart from physiological psychology at the beginning of the 20th century. Social psychology particularly studied “complex psychological processes, such as thought and fantasy, through analysis of their collective products – language, myth, and custom” (Danziger, 1992, p. 311). However, at the time, social experimental psychology had scope limitations regarding local, proximal, short-term, and decomposable effects (Danziger, 2000, pp. 333-334).
In the initial phase, data sources, theoretical conceptualization, task administration, and publishing did not widely differ from each other. At times, the experimenter used to take the role of the subject. Similarly, subjects were also often found performing the role of data collector. Danziger (1985) mentions the experimentations of Wundt often included these irregularities, and were seen as part of the proper manner of experimentation (Danziger, 1985, p. 134). Additionally, there was still no introduction of the idea that experimenters and subjects needed to be strangers (Danziger, 1985, p. 134). The primary reason for these characteristics was the social and cultural context in which Wundtian experimentation was born, grew, and was being developed (Danziger, 1985, p. 135). This setting was the 19th century elitist German university. Gradually, these roles were specifically defined, in order to get proper results and better usage of experimentation in psychology.
While these phenomena were taking place in Leipzig, at Wundt’s laboratory, Paris was also developing their systematic modeling of experimentation in psychology. This model was experimental hypnosis, which means that psychological investigations were done “under conditions of experimentally induced hypnosis” (Danziger, 1985, p. 135). It differed greatly from the Leipzig model. In Paris, the nomenclature was used within consensus, which primarily came as a result of lesser complexity in the social structure. Experimenter and subject had defined and restricted roles. Subjects were not given the elevated status as in Leipzig’s model (Danziger, 1985, p. 135). Thus, these two models were built on parallel to each other in the continuously evolving psychological experimentation.
Therefore, the Paris model evolved in the late 19th Century from physiological and medical investigation performed by French physiologists François Magendie and Claude Bernard (Strien, 2005). It evolved as a model seeking for the answers to the abnormal functioning condition of the mind (Danziger, 1985) via the general science model for research on human subjects (Strien, 2005). During its experiments, there was a clear distinction between experimenter and subject roles. The experimenter was in charge, while the subject was the object of study (Danziger, 1985). This typically asymmetrical role relationship was defined by the respective medical terms: subject and experimenter (Strien, 2005).
These two models evolved in the mentioned directions until 1930, during the period after World War I. It was at this moment when the evolution of psychology continued in the United States, while providing a synthesis of the Leipzig and Paris models (Mandler, 2007). Fundamental differences between the German and the American experimental psychologies relied on its social aspect. Gestalt psychology and the philosophy of Cassirer drove Germans into a non-individualistic approach, the Volkerpsychologie. Meanwhile, Americans followed an individualistic approach and an inductivist philosophy of experimentation (Danziger, 1992, p. 309).
The German model of structuralism and the American model of functionalism shaped psychology. Structuralism focused mainly on the anatomy and structure of ideas while functionalism focused in describing how these ideas relate to each other and how they work (Titchener, 1898). Therefore, experimental psychology made a shift from structuralism to functionalism.
However, after World War II, another important change took place in the history of the social psychology experimentation. Stanley Hall realized that individuals represented not only a source of problems, but also a source of data (Danziger, 1985). The American model had more in common with the Paris model than with the Leipzig model. Accurate terminology existed in this new setup and social context of experimental psychology. The shift from the analysis of individuals to the analysis of the distribution of populations took place. Americans adapted statistical methods and realized that they represented a valuable tool for experimentation within the field of psychology (Danziger, 1985). The American model became, thus, a hybrid between the theoretical framework and conceptualization provided by the Paris model and the new statistical and mathematical approach.
Both the Leipzig and the Paris models in the 19th century were heavily influenced by a Laplacian mechanistic and deterministic view (Strien, 2005). Variance was acknowledged to the imperfection of registration of reality, and not to the random condition of nature. Probabilistic approaches were disregarded and seen as the result of the ignorant mind. During the second half of the 20th century, the American model vindicated the role of probabilistic and statistics in experimental psychology (Strien, 2005).
Conclusion
In summary, the history of experimental psychology is relatively new, having started in the 19th century. Its roots include physiology and medicine. Several events have divided the experimental psychology into different models and schools of thought over time. Three of the most remarkable models were first the Leipzig and the Paris models, and then the American model. The 19th century Leipzig model focused on studying the collective and normal mind while the Paris model sought to understand the individual and abnormal mind. Thus, modern social experimental psychology has its origins in the Leipzig model. The Paris model heavily influenced Americans during the 20th century. Europe neglected the use of probabilistic and statistical approaches in the development of their schools during the 19th century. Nevertheless, the United States enhanced the role mathematics has in psychological research, thus shaping our nowadays conception of the science of the mind.
References
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